CAIRO: For the most part, writers of fiction stay within the boundaries of the parallel world they have created. Ahdaf Soueif however tackles current socio-political concerns. Following her success as an author, and as an Egyptian writing in English, she was recruited by her readers and the British press to shed some light on the issues that plague the Middle East.
Soueif has written for a number of newspapers and magazines, including The Guardian, the Sunday Telegraph, and the Washington Post. In November 2004, Bloomsbury published “Mezzaterra: Fragments from the Common Ground, a collection of her essays written between 1981 and 2004, many of which have been syndicated throughout the world.
They are the direct result of Soueif ‘s own circumstances of being, as she explains “like hundreds of thousands of others: people with an Arab or a Muslim background doing daily double-takes when faced with their reflection in a western mirror.
Invited by the Diwan bookstore on the occasion of their 5th Anniversary, Soueif talked to The Daily Star Egypt about her role as an activist:
The Daily Star Egypt: Your popularity as an author, both in Egypt and abroad, has given you a prominent voice as a political and social commentator. Is this a role that you have welcomed, or one that was thrust upon you?
Ahdaf Soueif: At the beginning – the end of 2000 – I did welcome it, because it gave me an opportunity to write about Palestine; to do basic reportage and let people speak for themselves and just use my skills as a novelist to frame that situation.
Why did you choose to focus on the Palestinian issue?
Because it is so close to my heart. It is the central issue of our times. It’s incredible to me that such a big injustice should be happening now on a daily basis in the information age, and despite the whole discourse of human rights, it’s allowed to continue to happening.
Does your role as a commentator vary from London to Cairo?
I don’t have a role here. There are many people who can do what I do better. But [in London], there really isn’t.
You don’t think that someone living abroad like your, could give us the other side of the story?
There is no other side of the story, only our side. Who’s bombing who?
During the 2005 presidential elections in Egypt, you wrote several articles for The Guardian. What message did you hope to relate to your readers?
Several. On the one hand, there is this whole discourse about moderate states and democratic states, which is basically used in a way that denotes bad faith. It seemed important to disabuse the English reader of the notion that good people here are actually at one with the US and Britain in their policies in the region.
I also have friends and relatives that are activists here and I would check whether this was something people here thought was useful.
It’s a story that wants telling. Basically the system here relies on the support of the United States and Britain is very close to the US. The West is also responsible for what the system does to us, and people should know about it.
What was the response?
It was very interesting. If it’s a Palestinian issue, then you get positive and negative responses. What’s interesting is that when I first started writing about Palestine in December 2000, the responses were evenly divided between good and bad. Now, the good far outweigh the bad.
This isn’t because of me. This is because the general level of information and the moral issues have actually hit people. There are many more people who are aware of and supportive of the Palestinian cause, and see it as key to the problems of the region.
Do you see a solution to the Palestinian problem?
Of course. I believe that if the world is going to survive, then somewhere down the line – in a hundred years or so – there will be a solution and it will probably be a single state. But it’s not my place to offer solutions, I’m not Palestinian. I see it as my place to just point out what’s happening, and point out the levels of hypocrisy, and point out that there are solutions.
But whether it’s one state or two states, something will have to happen. And if it doesn’t then I don’t know what’s really going to happen in the whole region, and even in the world. This conflict has infected people across the world. People are angry. It’s no longer an open problem that can be left to fester this way.
Last December, you joined a group of British artists and writers in a “cultural boycott of Israel. What do you hope to achieve?
I think, ultimately, there needs to be a regime of sanctions against Israel, like the regime that was in place against South Africa. Nothing short of that is going to work. And it has to begin somewhere.
So is this boycott symbolic?
It’s not symbolic. Artists are meant to be the antennae of society, they are also meant to be the conscience of society. If your job is to empathize with people to the point where you can write about them, how can you turn away from a real life situation that is so flagrant?
Some say this isn’t the right way and that culture is about communicating with people not isolating them, but let’s be generous and say for sixty years everybody has been communicating. Maybe it’s time to try something else.
You had described authors as the “antennae of society. Do you feel this holds true in Egypt?
People get tired ultimately. You can never judge the level of activism of other people. Now I have to stop being an activist. It hurts me not to be at this rally or that demonstration, but I have to do it otherwise I’m not going to write a novel. So you can’t judge people’s circumstances, priorities, level of energy, level of exhaustion, level of disillusionment.
Your activism has attracted a lot of attention. Does this interfere with your writing?
Hugely. It blocks it.
As an Egyptian living in London, do you ever feel a responsibility to write about certain topics? Are you ever conscious during the writing process of how a western reader may interpret fiction as a real reflection of Egyptian society?
It’s problematic. If you become aware of this and you’re looking over your shoulder while you’re writing, you’re limiting yourself in a way that is not good for your writing.
I’m pragmatic. I’m no longer interested in writing things that are negative about us anyway, it’s not what I want to do. What I’m interested in is the political issues, whether I individuals can influence their context at all or not. Where does history come in? Can we learn from the past or are we doomed? If, in the course of writing this, I do write stuff which is negative then I’m not bothered. Let it happen.
The choice of topic dictates . once that choice is made, and the characters come to life, there can be no censorship or opinion or whatever. It’s just got to be what makes the best story, what makes an evocative story, what rings most true and will hit your reader in the heart.
Do you feel that your work has created a bridge of understanding between Western audiences and the Middle East?
When it does happen, the people who are willing to understand, do understand. You can’t reach those who don’t want to understand and have their own set of ideas and that’s it.
One of the basic problems I see is how do you translate the will of the people into political facts on the ground? I don’t know how you can achieve that.
What if you have compassion and still people are getting killed next door?
